


Better

by Specialist



Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-16
Updated: 2019-12-16
Packaged: 2021-02-26 02:21:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,360
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21815839
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Specialist/pseuds/Specialist
Summary: RCE 2019 fill derived from prompt #8.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7
Collections: Robin Christmas Exchange 2019





	Better

**Author's Note:**

  * For [reisling](https://archiveofourown.org/users/reisling/gifts).



“Rusty Nail, Johnnie Black three-to-one, with a stout back.”

The young man leans against the backrest after the bartender’s nod and resettles in his bar stool. He feels his leather glove creak as he presses his hand against the worn edge of the bar counter. An empty lowball and pint glass are lined up with two empty shot glasses in front of him. The din of conversations around the dingy dive bar dominates the background, punctuated with the clink of drinks.

“Move the goods tonight, while they’re busy with the mess on the other side—”

“The boss wants to meet while the weather is clear. Who knows when the next calm will be—”

“What a shitshow! Can you believe those crazies fucking up this bad?”

Locals clump in huddles throughout the floor, among other indifferent regulars and guests. The more discerning conspirators are conversing in low murmurs after losing the cover of clamorous live music.

“Gotham? Again? You think I’m stupid about sucker bets? Give me odds on how close Gotham gets to actually blowing up.”

“Look. If we put some effort to raise trouble here, here, and there, we can make it worse and extend the distraction to at least three days. Think of the shit we can get done with them off our backs. Who’s in?”

The young man shifts his situational awareness when he senses the bartender approaching him. He hooks his hand around the pint and then the tumbler as the bartender slides them over the counter, and lifts the scotch to his lips. _Going to miss this bar if things don’t work out_ , he thinks. Besides some overt assessing glances, which he pointedly ignored, he’s been left alone when he hunched quietly and drank. The respect for real violence is what he likes about this bar.

Tim told him once he found it ironic that Jason liked such a polite dive bar when polite and Jason were hardly ever in the same vicinity of each other. Jason had laughed because Tim didn’t get it. Then he had hit Tim because Tim didn’t get it.

Jason gradually finishes his drinks. As he listens to the scuttlebutt, he idly sends some texts to a few contacts whose reactions to the state of Gotham would help his interests. Jason motions for the bartender as the display time on his phone turns three. He tucks the burner phone back in his jacket and watches while he waits for the bartender to finish serving the other patrons.

Jason slides his hand over when the bartender comes by, and lets go after the bartender reaches for the cash. The bartender only takes a moment at the amount before sweeping the stack of money into his apron. “On your tab?”

“Nah,” Jason gets off his bar stool. “Close me out.”

* * *

“You got more than a litter this time, Jimmie?” The stocky man’s face is as cold and miserable as the warehouse inside the loading dock.

“You read the mail drop or not, Gene,” bit back Jimmie, stung by the dig. “Jesus, it’s not like I grab these off the street.”

“Uh-huh.” Gene said with great indifference. “Well?”

“Yeah,” glowered Jimmie. “I got three.”

“More mutts?”

“Purebloods, asshole. Good enough to book.” Smugness puffs Jimmie’s lanky frame out. “I want top dollar.”

“Bullshit,” says Gene, a little annoyance chipping his stoicism. “Your last ones barely broke even. We even had to dump a few of the runts. Bullshit, you have purebloods.”

“I got ‘em, you want ‘em or not?” Jimmie snaps, agitated. “’Cause if you don’t I’ll find someone who’s not wasting my time.”

“You selling to other people, Jimmie?” asks Gene, suddenly sounding almost friendly. “Is that why I’ve been getting trash from you?” The cluster of men behind their respective dealers shift and adjust their grips on their guns.

“No, Gene,” grits out Jimmie. “Why you always have to bust my balls? You know I haven’t been playing you when you’ve been straight. The stock is too hot to mess around.”

“Even you can tell that, huh?” Gene sneers. “Then why don’t you stop wasting everyone’s time and show what you’ve got.”

“Asshole,” Jimmie grouses softly, not loud enough that Gene has to take offense. The other dealer stares at him dispassionately with dead eyes. Resentment gnaws at Jimmie as he carefully opens his coat, showboating he’s not reaching for a piece, and starts to pull out a thick envelope. Neither he or Gene were carrying for the meet, as agreed, just their men.

A sudden thud startles the gathering. Almost in unison, the crews turn toward the sound and see an armored figure straightening from a half-crouch from where he jumped down from one of the warehouse containers.

“Hey. Nice get together you got going,” says the uninvited mercenary, standing in the shadows, arms loose at his sides. “But getting more boring by the second.” His mocking tone is eerily flattened through a modulator.

Jimmie tries to make out his face, but fails when he realizes the newcomer is wearing some kind of helmet. “Who the fuck are you?” he demands, clutching his envelope, as the men start to flank the intruder. “How did you get in here?” The meet was behind locked doors and both gangs had left two men guarding the entrance. The conversation hadn’t been heated enough to miss hearing a commotion. He’s not sure if the man is a new player or someone sent by the higher ups. “Start talking!”

Guns raise and point towards the mercenary, clicking as safeties snap off.

The mercenary turns his head minutely as if to think about it.

“Nah.” A gun seems to levitate to the man’s hand as he draws with lightning speed, sights, and fires at the closest tough who was starting to shoot. Then, the man side steps to ram another tough on his other side with his elbow, and throws him as the man doubles-up towards a third tough. Both armed toughs collide and go on the ground in a heap.

“Shit!” swears several men from both sides, scrambling to aim.

Jimmie sees a glint of red as the warehouse light finally lands on the moving newcomer. He turns his head when he hears Gene’s sharp inhale. “What?” he demands. “You know this clown?” Jimmie’s uneasiness worsens when he sees the other dealer backing up to run. The bad feeling is immediately overridden by his hair-trigger temper. “The fuck,” he spits, pissed that Gene, who always treats him like shit, is running. He shoves the papers back in his coat. _I knew Gene was a pussy_ , Jimmie thinks, _Fuck him, I can take care of this. Gene can eat shit_.

The mercenary catches a fourth man’s forearm and shoves as the man fires. The bullet goes wide and the mercenary lunges to palm strike the fourth man up from the chin. He double taps the fifth man with his gun in his other hand, and steals the firearm from the staggering fourth man. He spins the gun in a semi-circle for a better grip and then shoots the fourth man, while kicking at one of the men who finally struggled back up from the ground. The one the mercenary didn’t kick is aiming at him and the mercenary shoots him in the hand with his original gun, messing up the shot, before the mercenary fires again, through the man’s face.

Jimmie, meanwhile, used the time to grab the gun off one of the downed men and to get closer. He shoots the intruder twice in the chest, sending the man staggering back as the rounds hit the body armor that the other man apparently had.

 _Shit_ , thinks Jimmie as the man rocks forward on the balls of his combat boots, unfazed, and stomps in the side of the remaining man on the ground before executing him. Jimmie panics as the man turns towards him. Jimmie fires a third time at the man’s chest, before correcting himself and trying to aim at the man’s head. He misses and clips the side of the other man’s red helmet as the man aims at him.

Jimmie has a moment of confusion as the mercenary fires past him until he hears Gene scream from somewhere behind him. Then, a sharp blast of pain as the man shoots Jimmie in the face.

The mercenary releases the clip from his stolen gun, before dropping it from his gloved hand over one of the bodies on the ground. He steps over to Jimmie’s body to snake his now empty hand inside the dealer’s coat. He pulls out the envelope.

The sound of the mercenary’s boots are loud as he walks down a long, bloody streak to the last, crawling man, who is struggling to get away.

Gene hears the Red Hood walk around him, in front of him, and then stop, out of arm’s reach.

Gene screams as the vigilante abruptly moves into his space and kicks his gunshot wound. The Red Hood turns Gene over onto his side with his boot, and crouches down. He casually rests his gun at Gene’s neck. “Better,” the Red Hood says. “Let’s get to the interesting part.”

The muzzle of the gun starts tracing down the bulletproof vest over Gene’s chest, and over to Gene’s side, where the Red Hood feels the uneven pressure of a seam, near the gut. “You seem like a smart one.” There is a rustle of paper as the Red Hood turns Jimmie’s envelope in his other hand. “You better hope I don’t have to ask too many times.”

The Red Hood’s voice trails in an atonal buzz for moment, before clicking back with eerie menace. “Who’s the buyer?”

* * *

Shorty’s stack was on the money. Two hitched trailers were parked innocuously in plain sight on one of the hills at the outskirts of town. They could’ve belonged to any of the poorer families in the area.

Good as the info was, Jason only feels a steely grimness. He had set off moves to contain the immigrant child trafficking operation before he left Gotham to clean it up. Yet, here was another shipment. Six months of gathering information and trying to tip whistle blowers to blow out the entire rotten hill of corruption were useless. The current socio-political reality allowed any rot to reform and to fester. Jason had done the math. Ending the main source will finally disrupt the operation long enough for bureaucracy to hopefully, finally carry the day. Jason’s been waiting for weeks for the right timing to pull this op. He’s eager to get to Screamer’s buyer and be done with it.

Jason steps over the sprawled body of the guard he just downed.

His head hurts. The dampness at his temple is too tacky to be only sweat, but Jason only noticed when he registers the red on his gloves after he touches the knot of pain where his opponent had cracked the crown of his helmet with a reinforced baton. He had to forgo the sturdier Red Hood mask for a generic dark helmet for this side-op. He needed the low-profile.

Jason touches the wall next to the steps leading up to the door of the trailer to ground himself. From his quick recon, the downed guard should have been the last one.

There had been about half a dozen guards, a number set by the necessity of keeping low-key. The men had been better armed and better trained to make up for the lower numbers. Jason still didn’t have much trouble dispatching the guards despite the harder fight.

The men had been weirdly distracted. His instincts have him on high alert. He might have missed something.

Jason starts to hop on the stairs to clear the holding area, when the door of the other trailer opens, roughly twenty feet from him. The movement takes Jason off guard.

All of the children in the photo stack were under twelve. Even if any of the immigrant kids had managed to untie themselves during the fight outside, Jason knew none of them would just come outside. Not with how the traffickers had gotten them.

Where hesitation can mean death, Jason reacts instantly and moves his gun to fire.

There is a young woman trying to get out. Wrong clothes. Wrong build. Wrong everything.

 _Fuck—_ Jason doesn’t have the time to stop, only the time to see it was not a guard. He jerks, throwing off his aim.

She goes down screaming.

Adrenaline floods him, pushing back the fuzziness in his head, as Jason swears explosively. Jason keeps his gun up and checks his sight lines quickly, just to make sure the girl isn’t a distraction. He sees nothing. He jumps off the step and runs over to the the open door of the other trailer.

“Oh my god, please don’t kill me!!” the girl sobs noisily as Jason comes into view. She is shaking violently as she clutches her bleeding arm. “Please please don’t—”

“Shut up! Shut up now,” orders Jason, clearing the space behind the girl. No guards, just huddled children in the back, near the beds. Jason lowers the muzzle of his gun to the floor and drags the hyperventilating girl in. He ignores her weak shoves to let go and yank the door closed. “Damn it!”

“Oh god,” the girl moans. “Why is this happening? Oh fuck—” The young woman is in her twenties, wearing a hoodie stitched with the local college’s logo over sweats. Jason has no idea why she is here, in the middle of a child trafficking ring.

“Why are you here?” Jason snaps. “You working with them? Dating them?”

“Wh-what?” she says faintly, going unnaturally pale. “Wor— Dat— no!”

Jason stops studying her and puts away the gun. He goes for his emergency med kit.

While forcing a pressure bandage on her arm, Jason finds out a few things: The woman is student at the local college. She had noticed the odd trailers several times while hiking and recently heard odd noises when passing them. Hits. Crying. She had been worried it was child abuse. However she wasn’t sure. It could’ve just been some disciplining that got out of hand. She didn’t want to call social services if she were wrong, so she decided to investigate quietly. The men had caught her and thrown her in one of the trailers with the kids just before Jason showed up. She heard the fighting and managed to untie herself to make a run for it. Straight into Jason.

“Fuck,” Jason says.

The girl recoils.

“No, not— I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to shoot you.” He puts the girl’s free hand back over her wounded arm and lets go. He steps around his helmet, which he had slammed on the floor after roughly yanking it off his head, and ducks out to grab a phone off one of the bodies outside. He dials for emergency services and, after a moment, tosses the phone on the ground with the line open. Jason comes back inside and says, “An ambulance is coming.”

The woman looks up at unsteadily at his domino-covered face. “You d-didn’t mean to shoot me?”

Angry self-recrimination flushes through him. “Fuck no,” Jason snarls. “Just the assholes outside. The traffickers. Thought you were one of them when you jumped out.”

“O-oh my god, th-these poor kids. What the hell, I th-thought maybe it was some asshole being neglectful, maybe a-abusive. Tr-trafficking? I- M-My d-dad’s going to kill me!”

“Hey. Hey, no. If your dad’s killing anyone, it’s me,” Jason says awkwardly.

“A-are you kidding, you’d murder him!”

“Not interested in murdering him.” The young woman is still crying. Jason feels like shit. “Hey. My old man is going to be pissed at me—” An absolute understatement. “—and he will kick my ass. If that cheers you up.”

“Th-thanks.”

“Yeah, no.” Jason picks his helmet up as he mentally tracks the time. He needs to bail before the emergency services arrive. “Just stay alive.”

* * *

According to Screamer, Mr. Joseph Browning is scheduled for a meeting at a building today.

“Hey.” The guard looks up, gun muzzle turning with his shoulders. Jason double taps him in the heart, which only knocks the guard back thanks to the man’s body armor. The man shoots off a wild round as his aim is thrown and swings his arms back up, regrouping. His yell cuts off when Jason fires a round through his head. Jason hops down as the body falls and steps over it to check the walkway around the corner. Jason jogs quickly to the next check point when he confirms the way is clear.

Joseph is a key executive who is central to the trafficking ring’s operations. Jason hasn’t found him yet. He scans the area, analyzing the magnified visuals in his helmet. Joseph is supposed to be here. Wariness tightens Jason’s shoulders. The earlier gaffe half a day ago has shaken him and he is on edge. He’s caught himself double-checking several actions and he needs to knock that off.

Jason turns the check point corner and sees the executive.

Jason steps back, to the side, and lifts the barrel to the target’s center mass, He lines up the sight against the man’s lower abdomen and raises it toward the head. He has a clear shot. Disquiet has Jason checking the target’s face and, for a split-second, he recalls Bruce’s harsh voice, his reprimands about killing.

Sheer instinct has Jason jerking back before the silenced sniper shots blew through his head. “Fuck!” he spits savagely, realizing his hesitation cost him his shot. He snaps off three rounds, firing back and hears a cut off yell as he lands the hit. Jason staggers as he ducks behind a shipment container to readjust his footing from lunging back but is yanked off balance when another attacker abruptly closes in. Jason feels the pressure of the man’s arm snaking around his throat as the attacker gets behind him. Jason jerks out the Ka-Bar from the sheath on his belt with his free hand as he tries to get his gun in front of his neck and hears metal scrape against his gun as he stabs behind him and carves up.

The man screams and Jason feels the attacker’s stance break as the man’s arms jerk. Jason kicks viciously as he yanks his knife free and knocks the flailing limb away with the butt of his gun. He hears a thud as the man falls back.

There is a warm line across his neck from where the knife went across the front of his reinforced under suit.

Jason falls back against the wall and inhales sharply.

The warmth flames into a harsh burn.

Jason watches his fingers shake as he tries to put away his knife. When Jason touches his neck, he realizes his chest is wet.

 _Huh_ , he thinks, suddenly dizzy. He tries to press down, press the slit across his throat closed. _Shit_.

Through the sudden loud thud of his heart in his ears, Jason hears someone desperately running. He looks up through the pain and sees the target rabbiting.

He doesn’t think twice.

He lets go of his throat to steady his gun hand to shoot. He fires, feeling the kick back against his arm go through him like a blow to the chest. He watches the target drop and his gun drops from his weakening grip.

 _Done_ , he thinks as things tilt and his vision blackens at the edges. His neck radiates pain.

 _And done_ , Jason thinks, light-headed. He wants to laugh. _I am laughing_ , he realizes, hearing a breathless wheezing. _What a joke. I choked on my own op._ Goddamn _Bruce_.

Amusement bubbles through the heavy lethargy that sinks him to his knees. He has his hands over his open throat but he doesn’t have the strength to hold it closed. Jason knows this feeling. His body is shutting down.

 _Better than last time_ , Jason thinks. _Better than Bruce choosing_.

* * *

The cavern ceiling is high and dark. It's rock but it seems to be roiling. Just a little. Jason spends a solid minute stumped by the oddity before he remembers the bats.

Then he realizes he's awake. After a moment struggling with his sluggish thoughts, he works out he's also heavily medicated, even by his metabolic standards. He probably shouldn't be awake. Or alive.

 _Huh_ , Jason thinks. The bruising from blunt force and projectile impacts, the damage carved across his neck, and the ache burnt across his chest all feel dislocated. Under the shock, Jason feels the undertow of emotional fallout. Jason forces it down with the ease of expert practice.

Unease prickles his skin. The feeling of hostility has him reflexively searching for a source. He struggles to turn his head, flares of pain lining up as he moves, and finds a glare over a scowl.

“Hi, asswipe,” says Tim when Jason focuses on him. Tim is sitting in his Red Robin gear in a chair next to Jason's medbed. The smudges under his eyes seem darker than usual. Jason doesn't think it's just the lighting from Tim's open laptop.

“Hey,” rasps Jason, grinding out the sound. His throat aches dully, even through the drugs. “Sucks to see you too.”

Tim smiles tightly at the sound of Jason's hoarse voice. “Not as much as when you see Bruce. Your hot mess dropped bodies every-fucking-where.”

Jason is too drugged to react fast enough when his brother leans over and punches him, with the force of wanting to punch him a lot harder, just below Jason’s bicep. “Almost including yours, genius.” Tim resumes typing on his laptop.

“Ow.” Jason exhales. The IV line pulls at its insertion point at his elbow from the jostling. “You offended I almost did or offended I almost didn’t?” He smirks, watching Tim’s hands tighten on his laptop as if he were resisting the temptation to throw it at Jason’s head.

“Offended that you swanned off to do shit that would piss Bruce off and left me the half-assed note to pass to Bruce,” hisses Tim, eyes narrowed. “And topped it off with almost getting killed.”

Jason acknowledges Tim’s comment with a slow blink. “You showed up just in time.”

“Jason, if Dick hadn’t offered to help me take part of my patrol and I had found your flash drive at the dive bar an hour later,” Tim says, face serious. “We wouldn’t have.”

“Huh.” Jason contemplates that. The thought tugs at the undertow held under by his obstinacy. He stops contemplating it. “Well.”

“Great comeback. Please lead with that. Bruce will eat you alive and I can use the laughs since I had to haul your heavy ass out of that mess.”

“Sure,” says Jason, “I hope he chokes on me while trying to swallow his own bullshit.” Jason curls his fingers and reaches up.

The light clatter of keys slow to a stop. “What are you doing?”

“What does it look like I’m doing, genius?” mocks Jason, pulling out the IV. He slowly rolls to his side as he tries to lever himself up. He needs to get up. He is not sure why he's here in the Batcave. He doesn’t know if he's safe.

“It looks like a giant idiot getting up after massive hypovolemic shock to finish himself off,” observes Tim, without trying to push Jason back down, proving he did have a functional set of survival instincts.

“A plus observational skills,” pants Jason, vision tunneling as he feels his blood pressure drop and pain jerk into place. The dull throb of his injuries shudder to sharp pain. He concentrates on staying up. It’s harder than it should be.

“Except,” continues Tim, nonchalantly, “Bruce is here before you can continue being a giant idiot.”

“What,” says Jason, jerking his head up. His vision smears out for a second, and when it focuses, Bruce is looming over him. Tim is studiously focused on his laptop screen.

“Jason,” says Bruce, his tone perfectly, implacably level.

On a scale from one to ten, both of them could tell that tone was a twenty. Jason figures he might as well go for broke. “Bruce,” he mirrors, trying to discreetly blink away the spots in his vision by obnoxiously fluttering them.

“Thirty-one dead and one injured.” Bruce's detached expression is like a carved mask. He watches Jason’s jaw twitch. “You killed a lot of people.”

“I put down a lot of asocial predators,” retorts Jason, flashing a sharp smile.

“Are college students asocial predators now,” Bruce says with an edge of disdain.

Jason knew that verbal jab was coming, but the hit still lands. He still tenses all over. Before he could snap a comeback, Tim shifts his chair.

“You know, some would argue fraternity prophytes fit that profile,” interjects Tim, sensing the escalation. Tim slowly closes his laptop as he succeeds in breaking the intensifying glare between Bruce and Jason, and they both turn their stares on him. “Right, I’ll just let you two… talk.” He jumps from his chair with the laptop tucked under one arm, pulling out his cell phone, and hustles to the entrance upstairs.

After a long moment of silence, Jason grits his teeth and goes back to getting up. Bruce could stand there like a judgmental statue for all he cared. He would be damned if he gave in and spoke first. He doesn’t even want the argument Bruce wanted to have.

When Jason finally makes it to his feet, Bruce says, “You should have turned the criminals over to the police.”

Standing is an effort— everything right now is an effort— but the cold helps Jason focus. He’s in the medical shift that’s their version of a hospital gown. It’s thin and loose, so it has no insulation whatsoever. Unlike his thoughts, which feel thick from the swathe of drugs.

“So that their contacts can get them back out? Or so they can run the trafficking from the inside?” Jason scoffs. “Unroll Brucie for the idiots, Bruce. If I can see the writing on the wall, you definitely know the stakes of the intel.”

“That's not an excuse for killing them, Jason,” says Bruce. “We could've taken countermeasures for those problems if you had not gone off.” His lips thin as his even tone turns disapproving. “And got injured.”

Even though Jason has resigned himself to rejection since Bruce had chosen between him and the Joker, the disapproval still stings. Jason knows better, he knows he needs a cool head in any spar with Bruce, but his anger still flares. “Your countermeasures are shit!” Jason snaps hotly. “Exhibit A: Arkham. And this—” Jason swipes a clammy hand over the bandages fastened around his throat. “—is because I thought twice, not because I had gone off.”

Bruce watches Jason. “There is a right way to handle things, Jason—”

“The right way was they didn’t walk away,” Jason says sharply. “And they’re not.”

Bruce’s cool tone seems indifferent to Jason’s building agitation. “The right way was due process and trials before the public.”

Jason can't stop his strangled laughter from wrenching out. “Don’t play this game with me,” he rasps, eyes gleaming with derision. “I know the scoring better than you.” Intimately, inside and out, Jason does. Bruce's privilege is a shortcoming on this field, and he knows it.

Bruce changes tack. “It's not a game. This is about people's lives—”

“Yes, it is,” Jason says, frustration building. “About people's lives. Children's lives. Even you can’t object over that.”

The line of Bruce’s lips crease in a frown. “All lives—”

“Not all lives, Bruce! Just the ones that matter!” Jason says, frustration shifting to anger. This will go nowhere. Jason hates this argument, but Bruce always wants to have it. Bruce always wants to play the moral man, the better man. “You don't get to choose that everyone lives, Bruce! You get to choose who lives by choosing who dies, so that they can live.” The anger clears some of the drugged fog from his thoughts. “You should have learned that,” Jason grates. He reaches up and rips at the fastening, pulling the bandages. Bruce's hand twitches, but stills as Jason drops the bandages and lets them splay out on the ground.

Jason runs his thumb and forefingers across his bare throat. He can feel a line of stitches, a row of markers across the cut that nearly killed him, and then rough skin at the side. He meets Bruce’s burning eyes and draws his thumb under the scar, pointing out the reminder. “You choose before,” Jason says hoarsely. “You know better, Bruce.”

“No, Jason,” says Bruce carefully, in a way that infuriates him. “Who has the right to decide which lives matter? I don't decide who dies. I just choose to save everyone I can.”

Jason stares. “All that moral high horse,” Jason says, unsteady. “And not an inch of decency.”

Hurt, rage, distress, nausea, fear, everything Jason forced back when he woke, when he realized he was alive, is surging. The undertow had been beneath but now he is in it, being dragged under. Jason grasps the anger. He grabs his throat in hurt fury.

“Maybe if the buyer had still been alive when you caught up, you’d have saved him by using another Batarang on me,” sneers Jason. “Was that it? I was the only one left, so you just took what you got? You should’ve left me.” He hooks his fingers and digs into his skin, presses into his wound. Bruce’s eyes narrow.

“Because when it comes down to who gets to live, I choose the ones who matter Bruce. I'll always choose. So, if you mean it when you say you want to save everyone that you can, _you should have left things as they were!_ ” Jason tears out the first stitch holding his throat together.

“Don't—!” Bruce lunges toward Jason, hand going towards Jason's upraised arm. He stops short.

“What, you want to help? Remembered you're too decent to do it?” Jason sneers, fingers caught in the blooming red seam at his neck. “Don't worry, _I'll_ fucking do it.”

Distantly Jason notices someone has come down, but he's too angry to pay attention. It doesn't matter anyway.

“Master Jason, stop!” Alfred says forcefully, alarm strong in his voice.

“Why?” spits Jason, eyes on Bruce’s frozen face. He rips out the next stitch, watching the minuscule tic in his adoptive father's jaw.

“Stop!” Tim snaps, reappearing with Alfred, “You’re reopening your wound!”

Jason roughly shrugs off the hand that tries to pull on his shoulder, sending another wash of red down his neck.

“ _That's the idea_. I’m fixing what you’re always too two-faced to do!” His voice distorts as he rips at his throat. “ **Why did you even bother!** ”

Reopening the wound hurts worse than when the mercenary first slit his throat. It still hurts less than the mess in his head. The mass of emotions, disrupted by turmoil and smeared by drugs, was swelling towards hysteria. He doesn’t know how to stop the feelings. If it would make it stop, Jason thinks he would carve into his chest and tear out his heart.

The sharp stab of a needle bites his arm and Jason snarls, reaching over and yanking it out. He shoves hard at Tim, to open space between them. “Don’t!” Jason yells. Furious, Jason lurches in to punch him. Tim dodges.

Jason sees Alfred shake his head quickly on his other side. He painfully looks back at Bruce who is still standing where he has been, from the beginning, as always.

“Master Jason,” says Alfred’s voice, way too close. Jason feels another jab at his shoulder. “Please, stop.” Jason reflexively grabs Alfred’s wrist but doesn’t retaliate. He is still looking at Bruce as the sedatives kick in, the dosage finally strong enough to bring him down.

“You always,” Jason forces out, guttural from hurt and despair, “Break my heart.”

He goes down hard.

He is out when Bruce steps over. He doesn’t see when Bruce carefully gathers him up or when he mouths, “You always break mine.”


End file.
